E107. Theme over mechanics with Get Into Games On Air

Welcome to Meeple to Meeple, uniting players around the world. A 30 minute exploration of TJ and Gareth's four-game experiences from across both sides of the Atlantic. Each episode they share their thoughts and opinions on the world of four games, including their favorite themes, games, hot topics, and much, much more. Hello and welcome to Get into Games on Air, a podcast about board games and the people who play them. And welcome to meeple to meeple. As always, I remain PJ.

This is episode one O 7. Hold on. Whoa. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This is hello. This is Game to Games on air. This is episode 40. This is an episode. What? Sorry. No. No, this is Meeple to Meeple episode one O 7, a podcast duo I'm. Sorry, sorry. This is this is again to Games on Air. It's a podcast duet I think you'll find. No no, this is Maple to Maple episode one O 7, a podcast dual.

No, this is this is episode 40, a podcast dos I can't think of any more Dual dual name dual dual dual. Dual dual duet. It's episode 40 anyway. It's episode 107. 44. You guys stop arguing. OK. Oh, you're here too. Hi, we're all. Here. Hello, as as you can hear those dulcet tones of episode 107. All right, is the wonderful PJ from meeple to meeple. If you're listening to this on the get into games feed, of course. And joining us, as always, is Rebecca. Hi. Hey, Becky. Yes.

OK, just so we can. Put it yes, we. Are we can put it? No, we're not. Yes, we. Are I am not going to argue with you. Right. I will rise above the bait. We can end this. No, you will not do. You want to play a game, let's play a game. Yes, let's play a game. OK, you have to try and guess the game from the true words. It's ever told you right? So the clues. The clues will get more less abstract, so you'll be able to work out the game as you get more clues. Interesting. OK.

So it's it's evolution. No, the first word is grid. Grid Cities. No. Hues and cues. No second word. That's a good guess. Yellow. Yellow grid. Yellow grid. Yellow grid sounds like trauma here. Yellow grid, yellow grid, yellow grid. OK, I think the arguing is over. Craig. What's a yellow grid? Yellow. Grid, just play a game that comes to your mind. With a yellow grid in it, yeah. With a yellow grid. Grid. Oh. A yellow grid. Maharani Maharani. No, yeah, I didn't. Say no, Ronnie, are you

guessing? Yeah, I'm guessing. I'm guessing it's a grid of squares from Marshall. No next, but that's a good guess. Dice. Dice. Well, of course it's dice. It's a yellow grid of squares, so yeah. Dice you're. Going to do this with a. Grid. Of grid of dice. A yellow grid of dice. Yellow grid of dice. OK, is it a grid of yellow dice or is it a yellow grid of dice is? It dice throne dice. Yellow grid? No, it's like grid yellow dice. Grid yellow. Dice grid yellow. What did you say, Dice?

Dice Miner Dice miner is. What dice Miner No. On Earth. No, I know. Next word is people. Oh, that's easy. Meatball to Meatballs episode 107. Have you got a game up? That's cool. Might be getting to games as episode 14, I don't know. Oh. Grid, grid yellow, yellow dice. Dice people. Great yellow dice people. Great yellow dice, people. Man. She don't make it easy, does she? Are you staring at your game collection? Because that's what I'm doing. Yeah, grid yellow.

I have to on on people before. It came here. Wow grid. Yellow. You want the last word. No, you're not. How about? How about how? About salt and sea. No. How about the game of grid Yellow dice people? Kubitos. No last word. I bet you're going to get it now, Murder. Murder Cluedo. Yes. Oh. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry, that's clue. Oh, I'm sorry, it's actually episode 40. We had some feedback on the game and Oh yes, one of my friends said it was too hard because they were intro gamers who hadn't played many games. So they liked the game, but they didn't know what the games were because they hadn't experienced those games. So I thought I'd try out one that most people had.

Yes. And yes, and if you are listening to the podcast and you think we choose games that are too up to date and too modern, do better Ian, do better so. Wow. So I have AI have AI have a question Yellow grid yellow so the. Board yellow. The board with the spread with yellow. So the problem here in the US is we like to update everything every few years and I don't think it's yellow is. Is it grey now? Well, the picture. I, I think it's like a mar.

I think it's, I think it's meant to be marble and so it's kind of a grey. The original, the classic, the OG, the oregano. The oregano was definitely yellow. Anyway. No. What? What? We're going to talk. About So this show of the podcast, which is sponsored by Shirts and Merch. Shirts and Merch is a fantastic board game apparel company that ships worldwide to the world, not just in Old Blighty. They're based in Old Blighty, but they ship all over the world.

Most in America. Even the United States of America, and they do. Blood on the clock Tower, they do. Obsession they do. Snowdonia. They do Nemesis, they do all of your favourites in T-shirt form and they are the most comfortable long lasting T-shirts you will ever likely to own and wear. So go to games night in style in a shirts and merch, merch, shirt, shirts and merch. OK. Wow, it's. Etsy. Lads.

What have you been playing, PJ? So yeah, in this episode we are going to talk about, I'm going to talk over you because you have not introed my podcast properly. I thought she did a great job. Personally, I want Becky to introduce all of our episodes from now on. The problem is, I find that she just can't take turns. Well, you know, we're not going to argue about that. I can't. Argue.

You guys are mean. Becky cannot Becky cannot in fact play turn take turns and so to we're going to come back to that. To answer your question in this episode, one of seven of meeple to meeple I I I just returned from St. Louis, MO, where I was a geek way mini all weekend. 400 guests only. So it's a limited limited badges. They have a games library and the Play and Win library. But I noticed some people playing Heat Pedal to the Metal.

And I think it was like a little, I think a group of people, it wasn't sanctioned by Geek Way, but a group of people organized a little tournament. And so they played all the different race tracks, which I think there were four currently with two more on the way. Right. But what did we, what did we, what did we learn?

Craig, when you taught me how to play Heat, we learned that when you're trying to go around a corner, take a turn on the road as it will, is that your Co host, lovely as she is, cannot take turns. That's. True or. Maybe you precious a lot a little bit too. So, yeah. And So what? What sort of games did you play at Geek Way? Then how did did you have a good time? What was what was happening? We did a mini. We had a fantastic time. So why? Why mini?

There's a bigger geek way to the West in May. I think it's probably about 5 or 6000 attendees with a small vendor Hall still has a Play and win library, still has a games library, a couple of events, some demos and things like that. But on a small scale, this is even smaller. It's all one big conference room and it's nothing but play games. And in the Game Play and Win library, you get to put your name in. You check the game out.

When you check it back in, you can then do a review and it puts your name in the hat, in the hat to be to win a copy of that game at the end of the weekend. We played 27 unique titles over the course of three days. That's pretty good. That's. Pretty good. Yeah, a couple of highlights. We played. We opened the weekend with charcuterie I saw.

That. Let me tell you what that game is fun and and you got to think about like I have never racked my brain over where do I put the cheese and the crackers? And it's like, oh, there's square bread, which are crackers, and round bread, which are also crackers. But I got to make sure I put this, the round bread next to the aged cheese, and the square bread has to go next to the fruit. And then this group of fruit over here, I need one of everything.

I can't have any duplicates. Oh my God, just really so good. Like that picture perfect, but a cheese board, a board of meat and cheese instead. Like you know how picture perfect? We have to place the people in the right place for the photographs. Is it like that you have to place things on a board in the right place? No, it's because, so what's interesting is these are, I mean, now the in the retail version, as we were talking about earlier, retail and

deluxe. In the retail version, it's all cardboard. So you can lay them a little bit on top of each other. The key is that for each cheese or bread, half of it has to be exposed to be considered as part of the group. So you don't want to stack them up too neat, too neatly. You want to spread it out and make it beautiful. And then you'll score the different groups on your cheese board. Yeah, it's worthy. It was a lot of fun that that game was crazy fun. It was not prepared for how much

fun. And then and then we followed it up with a heavy 4 hours of civilution, which is great. That game was just Gareth played it a couple times and owns a copy. And yeah, that was incredible. That was an incredible game. And we're like, we knew we were like, oh God, I hope we win a copy of this game. But we played a lot of cool stuff. Intarsia is probably the game and I shared it with y'all while I was there. I don't know why people aren't

talking about this game. Beautiful wooden components. The insert is amazing because you keep everything in the box off to the side. You're laying. I, I can't remember what you call it. There's a there's a name for the technique. You're laying wooden panels on the floor of a cafe, right?

And so you have like the frames and then you have the inner frames and then you have the even smaller inner frame, and then you have these little wooden tables that fit in the middle and you score points based on how many of these you end up filling in at the end of the game. There's some other points, strategic scoring points as you go, but you're essentially building the floor of a cafe in It's a cafe to Paris. I think this is 18th or 19th

century. Beautiful game. And I'm like, why is anyone talking about this? We played it multiple times. We really wanted to win a copy of that, but we didn't. So that's unfortunate. We played men Neffer guys. Best game of the weekend, best game of the weekend. We're going to talk about that more in the second segment of this episode for sure. Let's see, what else do we play? We played a lot of games,

though. We did learn that far away, not the not the good far away by cherry picked games in outer space, but that I'm going to make some people mad here. That stupid card game that was a waste of 45 minutes of my time and I just can't get back. Yeah, I agree with. You. I don't. I don't see what fuss is about. I, I, I just my head, can't I? I get what it's asking you to do. You go on a walk, you collect the things, you bring them back for the people who want the things.

Craig's explained all that to me. I just can't be bothered to think through the process backwards. Just give me another. It's just. Yeah, it's, it's just not interesting. But I know a lot of people love it. Everyone know, I know they do. I mean, the best way to for me to explain far away is, OK, I'm going to lay down a certain number of cards. Was it 9 or 12? I don't remember the exact number from left to right. And then I'm going to score them from right to left. Fun. Great. Yeah.

Was there a theme? Oh, and I'm not. The art didn't do anything for me. Now I know people are people like the art. It's not for me. And that part that you can't do anything about. But I was like, you could strip away the theme and just be like, do I have enough of these icons, these maps, these, these little scarabs or whatever they are? And it's like, OK, yeah, great. That's the thing, isn't it?

I mean, as we're going to talk about later on about theme and and learning games, teaching games through theme, the the theme of that game, just it doesn't come through because what am I delivering? I'm delivering a skull 4 skulls like, oh, you wanted OK, I can get that. You want me to go to the pineapples and get the pineapples. I understand. Then there's like some random things I'm like, I don't, I

don't. Maybe if it was less, maybe if everything was less humanoid and more alien and more I'm exploring deep space to think like maybe then it might make more sense to me. But I just. And also it's quite rat like. You've got a hope that those cards come out and they sit properly because if you're unlucky, you're not scoring anything on the way.

Yeah, no. I So there's something to do with there's a number in the corner and when you play a card, if it's higher than the numbers that you previously played, then you get a smaller card that you put over top. So I was being really meticulous. My numbers were completely in ascending order. I was doing everything right. Oh but PJ, you don't have enough of this icon, so you didn't score any points. I'm like Oh well this card says I get 17 points Well no, you

don't have this. You don't have the icons in your past, but I do. I can see them. No, you haven't gotten there yet. Y'all don't understand this. This was a waste of my time and I'm done and I think I'm done talking about it. So yeah, let's. So if you need to get him a gift. Yep, we played some cool games. There was just a lot going on. We got to play Black Forest by UE Rosenberg. That was good. I'd never played Glass Rd. which is a prequel or a precursor or a previous. I don't.

It was good. It was really good. It was classic UE was really happy about getting an opportunity to play that. I finally got to play Wondrous Creatures. Yep. Yep, that that's a solid. That was solid. Oh, Ravens of No Ravens of Fort Forgers of Ravenshire. Yeah, with the big badger on the front. Yes. Beautiful, beautiful, well designed game as well. That was a lot of fun. We played it twice. That was, that was fantastic.

So you mentioned one of your guesses when we were trying to guess Becky's game was cities, right? So we finally got to play cities. Katie and I were a little concerned about the hype around cities. I don't get it. Oh, really? Did you play it wrong like we played it wrong, or did you play it right that we played it wrong? What I don't When you played two player, did you create a three by 5 grid or a three by three grid? Three by three, as we were told.

Yeah, it just now. I don't feel as bad about it as I did the previous game we talked about, but yeah, it was just kind of OK. It's a, it's a king domino. It's a, it's a step up from king domino. I think in complexity, it's like where you'd go next. I, I do, I still, I still think it does work better with more than two, but it does work. We quite like it just as a kind of after work get to the table game.

I think with four players, you're blocking each other and stopping each other from getting those better tokens. I think at two player always feel a little bit monotonous. After you've done a couple of rounds, you're like, yeah, I'm just picking up from this row and I'm picking up from this row and it it can be a bit. Yeah, and you have? More you have more choice because you're putting more

meatballs down. You have more choice at two players, whereas you don't have have every single selection. You have one choice to make in that row, whereas two players you have two choices in every single row. So you have more there's it's not as tight in a in A2 player game, but yeah, it's not, it's not it's not heavy, but it's.

No, it's not heavy at all. And I guess I was, you know, I think I think what worked against it is that Katie and I are big fans of Deavere. I don't know what it is, but they have really been producing solid quality titles, right? Like so much so that I have multiple Cal axes that are filled cubes filled, right? I mean, there's red cathedral, there's White Castle, there's bamboo Salton Sea. I remember, you know, I just, they're so good.

And I was like just everyone's talking about it and we're like, well, OK, we were. We walked away disappointed. This happened at UKGE didn't it? Because everyone saw Devere and they saw cities and they went. Devere are making amazing mid to heavy games at the moment in small boxes and it's not it's Phil Walker Harding. If you expect a heavy game then you're looking at the wrong designer.

But I think if you want to get people into devere games, it's quite a good like here's here's a devere game you can try and then not like other things. I, I think you're right. I think you're on or something. It did not occur. That didn't thought did not occur to us when we played it. I think we were comparing it to everything we own at home. That's I think if you're not familiar with Devere, it's a lightweight game. It's accessible, yes.

It would not be a waste of my time to play that with someone who was new to the gaming hobby or new to devere games as a whole. Yeah. Because I think also like Ouch is a devere game. Oh yeah, Ouch as well. Oh. Right. No. So did you want to explain? It yeah. So it's like it's a card game with cactus on it and you put out six cards and then you point to a side of the card and the flowers on the cactus depict how dangerous the cactus is going to be. So if it's got 3 flowers on it,

it's most dangerous. If you've got 2 flowers on, it's kind of all right and one flower is like you're probably going to be fine. So you touch a side and then you turn it over and if there is like a prickle on the side that you touched, you don't take the cactus. But if it's prickle free, then you can take it and put it in your collection. The kids love it. And the idea is that you're trying to collect sets of flowers and the highest number of Reds.

So you want to go for those threes because the more flowers, the more points you're going to get. But there's a risk that you're going to get stabbed by the cactus. When you say I've select the left hand side and you flip it over and then there's a cactus and you're so you lose the card. It's a really, yeah. So I think it's good for kids, but I think it's quite a nice, it's like a really nice quick filler between games.

So I think they do have a few in their collection that are kind of come see what we do and then you might like our heavier games. Oh yeah. Which I think all companies need because I doubt you're going to get White Castle out or Bamboo straight off the bat if you've got no idea of what. Yep, that's fair.

Hey, Speaking of filler games, I want to tell you about a game that, well, I don't have to tell you, but I'm going to tell our listeners a game that just blew me away and that we're committed to finding a copy and buying it. And that was Fairy Ring. I shared with some images of it with you. The components are gorgeous, they're amazing. That game is fantastic. I never would have.

Let's see who makes that. It's so the designers, Lawrence Grenier and Fabian Tangi Tangai. And I don't know what the company is 'cause I can't read that. Is it repos? Is that repos? Oh, maybe I don't know. But the the fairies are gorgeous. It's a two to four player. Fairies are moving around around the board in a circle, in a ring. Our cards kind of create a ring and we're just playing mushrooms in front of us. And when you land on a mushroom, you score points.

But if beware, if you land on your opponent's mushroom, they score points. But let's let's say I land on a purple mushroom in front of you, you will get the points. But if I have a purple mushroom in front of me, I will be able to score those as well. So that's nice. That game was that was fun, cute, quick, easy filler game. I can definitely say that your girls are going to love it. Yeah. It does look nice.

Yeah, we played Stock Exchange so I don't know if you're familiar with the card game Gift of Tulips, which is kind of similar where it's all about a Tulip market and you're manipulating the market of the the Tulip market in Denmark. Stock Exchange just takes that to a whole nether level That game is DOP is starting to do better with their games and

their game quality. Wooden components, these three-dimensional cardboard sheds where you hide the flower tokens because you get points based on where they end up in the market at the end of the game, right? Kind of like a Stock Exchange instead of a stock. Exchange, right? I don't like that. That game was a lot of fun as well. We played Wild Gardens finally. A lot of hype. Doing the rounds recently, yeah, it's.

Very pretty. Yeah, so we played it the first time and it gave me a physical headache. I was like, I was like, no, no, when you say brain burner, it literally burned my brain. The strategy Katie was like, would you think? And I could just see her all eyes glistening. She's so happy. And she loved this game. And I'm like, it was great. So on Sunday, the final day of the convention, I was like, let's play it again. First game of the day, right?

And we'll play it through. So you run you basically you, you have these beautiful wooden meatballs, although they're not meatballs, they're well designed, fully formed, head to toe people. And you're walking around like a garden and you're foraging different ingredients and you've got a market of recipes and they tell you what you need to cook that recipe. And then you also have a market of people that you want to serve those recipes too.

But of course, Craig only likes breakfast foods and Becky only likes cakes and Katie only likes the tea or whatever. So you've got to monitor all that. Plus you have to be on specific spaces that have a picnic table. You have to land on that and then take that action to cook or serve beautiful components. It's a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun playing it the second time. It was just as difficult, but I had a rest, so that was nice. And I was like, what? Wild Gardens guys?

It's gorgeous. The components are great. There's no deluxified craziness. It's a beautiful game at retail and it's a lot of fun with deep, deep, deep strategy. Like what? That's that's what I want from board games. So I have AI, have a question for you. You played 20, did you say 26 or 27 games? 27 games. So how so? How did you learn the rules? Did you use the rule book? Did you watch a how to guide? That is a great question, great question.

So the week before Katie was in her free time, she was watching how to play games because the play and win library was announced on Board Game Geek ahead of time, so you knew which games were in there. So she was just watching all these play to win, Play to win. Yeah. Well, it was play to win. She was watching how to play videos, right, if they were available. And then when you when you check the game out, they have taped AQR code on the inside of the Bach lid to a digital version of

the rule book. That way I can scan the QR code and read it on my phone while Katie's actually looking at the physical rule book. But at the end of the day, you go in, you select a game off the shelf, they scan it and your badge to check it out, you go to your table and you learn to play it right there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's quite a difficult skill, isn't it? Sometimes they're kind of. Yeah.

Read between the lines in the rule book, especially of it you know some rule books are better than others and you know it's quite difficult feat to fit in 27 Yeah, different rule. Books. It's it's true, you know, but The thing is, you know, as as hobbyists, there are trends, right? Yeah. So Black Forest is a perfect example. It's classic UE. If you play Huey Rosenberg's games, then you know his design, you know how his generally the

mechanics work, right. And we'll talk about not only theme but mechanics in the second segment of the show. So you can you could pick it up really easily. So sorry, I needed to learn a few things. That one was weird because it had the two wheels that kind of manage your resources. And so sometimes you had to spend resources so that you can make others. It was Black Forest, pick it up at your pick it up at your local game store now. Yeah, it's just it was it was

really interesting. And we did that with every single game. And of course we're doing it at two players. So it's like, OK, it's it's not easy. I'm I'm looking at some of my notes from the from the conference because from trying to what's another another one was Stone Spire Architects. I've seen a lot about. That same thing, we picked up the rule book, we looked at it. That game was great. We're really big into cartographers, so we have role player and all of its expansions.

So we were like we're familiar with the world. So it helped us, right. I think if, if you're one of the beautiful things with these play to win libraries is I think the best thing to do is take someone who's either new to the hobby or like early in the hobby, right? Because you know, some of these games, like I'm, I'm referencing other games to be like, well, I know this world. So I mean, you know, right. So it, it, it makes it intuitive, but what if you don't

have that right? What what if PJI have never played a board game beyond the classic Pluto and Monopoly? Monopoly, you know, and so how could I enjoy these games and get in as many of them? Well, you may not get in as many of them, but I think it's a great way where to teach the game, right? I could teach it to you. And then you're like, oh, OK. And then you get familiar with more games, which is why it's really good to play as many as

you can. You know, it's great because now we've set up, there are games we're looking forward to in 2025 that we wouldn't have known. So one of the things I absolutely love about the Play to Win libraries, there's another convention in March. I'll be going with Adam from Tabletop Vibes. He and I are going to go down. We're going to meet some other content creators in Nashville, TN will go to Tennessee game days. They too have a Play to Win Library.

The real thing about the Play to Win Library is that it gives you an opportunity to play a game and then be on the lookout for it in the future, and you get a chance to win them at the end. That's really nice. I don't think we have anything. We have nothing. Like that in the. UK like that do, yeah. And so, and Becky, you asked me before we were before the recording, yes, we won two different games because you're only allowed one per person,

right? And not everybody's going to win because there's not 400 copies of these games. But I won a copy of Men Nefer again, we'll talk more about it. And Katie won a copy of Civilution. So the two big heavy games that were our favorites, we both got a copy and it's beautiful because we're in the same household. So we get two games, we get 2 free games in the same household, which is amazing. And like you said, not everyone does this right.

Not conventions in in England don't have this play to win, but but y'all have something we don't like. Not that I'm aware of anywhere in the United States, maybe New York City and Los Angeles. I don't know. It would be really cool if there was a way to be able to rent a game so that I could play it and then determine if I wanted to buy it. But I think you you, you got something like that, don't you? I. Don't know, do do we? Yes, we do. It always comes as a surprise to you.

I'm shocked. Sorry, what's happening? Rent Shuffle. And roll who? You know, talk about them, he just said right into it. Amazing go. I did a really good job and I'm really upset with you right now. Hello ladies and gentlemen, this podcast is sponsored by Rent Shuffle and Roll. Rent Shuffle and Roll, as you would have heard, is a fantastic board game rental service. Here in Old Blighty itself, they rent. Hundreds. If not thousands, if not millions, but maybe hundreds of

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You very much for that beautiful segue. I enjoyed it because if your local. Game conventions don't offer a play to win option. Rank Shuffle and Roll is an excellent, excellent way for you and old lady to rent a game. And don't forget the code GI TG50 for 50% off exactly 2 of you in. The room it's. Really the and you are wondering what? Sort of games they have for Rent Shuffle and Roll. Rent Shuffle and Roll often do the the library at either Air Con or UKGE.

So you can actually play Rent Shuffle and Roll's board games and meet them at conventions and see what they're all about. And at UKGE you can try and open the safe because that's fun. Wait, tell me more. About the safe, Oh, it's a little. Gimmick that they have, and I think he's a little gimmick. He's like an. Escape room. You have to solve the puzzle and open. You win prizes. Yeah, you win. Prizes you get. Months you get stuff anyway. So so if I understand.

Correctly the your listeners in England can go to rent, shuffle and roll and if they put in the code GI TG50, yes, that's. GIT. GG50. What'll happen again? Oh, they'll get 50% off their. First month's rental with rent, shovel and roll. That is amazing. That's. That's a really great deal. If I lived in England, I'd enter the code and I would subscribe today. Absolutely. OK, so. The second-half of this wonderful episode is all about teaching games and how best to do that.

Is it through the theme? Is it through the mechanics? Yeah, What you're thinking, PJ? Yeah, so. We talked about this a lot and I think it's a great topic to talk about is teaching games is difficult. It's it's already one thing to learn and store all the rules in your head to just play a game. What if you have to teach? And that's a skill that needs to be nurtured. And you approached Gareth and I about this? Yeah, before. The holidays this. Is we've been building up to this?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. We want to. Talk about how themes and mechanics or mechanics can help teach a game, right? Yeah, absolutely. I mean. The I mean the first thing like you can learn how to play a game and you can play a game. That's one thing. Learning a game and being able to play a game is one thing, but being able to teach a board game, there's, there's a real skill in that.

Being able to know and break down the core bits of a board game to get someone who knows nothing to be able to nothing about the game, whether they're a beginner or they've played other board games, but they don't know anything about the game to really get involved. Like learning that skill is that it's a skill that is that some people have and some people sadly just just don't really. They don't. They don't have it. They don't have it. So how hard can it really be to teach a game?

Well, I'm glad you asked that question because I'm here to tell you that I'm still trying to teach you that this is episode one O 7 of people to people is that I'm not quite sure about that. I think this. I'm pretty sure this is episode 40 last I heard. Last time I heard so. So. You could see, you can see teaching. Teaching can be very difficult. Something as simple as this is in fact episode one O 7 of Meeple to Meeple.

And you want me to teach a complex game like On Mars or Menefer or, you know, anything else like that? Yeah, that's a real challenge. So Becky, what do you think about theme and mechanics generally speaking, about how that helps you to teach games? So I think, I think I've done a like a 180. I used to read the rule book and go, right, This is what you have to do logically in sequence, the steps you have to take to complete the game. Like this is how your term works.

This is the term structure. You know, you do this, I'll do this, you do this and I'll do this. But I think when you came over, I like, feel like I was missing something because there's so many games that have like brilliant themes. And then I think, oh, actually, if I think about it in terms of the theme, I'm going to get so much more out of it than just learning like, do this, do that, do that. And games have that.

Inherent in the rule book, but it's the one thing that we all essentially skip over and that's the flavour text, the story and the flavour within that gives you the theme and gives you a reason as what? What am I doing? I'm placing my worker here to gain something. Why am I doing that? I'm doing that to do that. What's what's that got to do with the theme of the game, right? And it just really just unlocks.

Something so not to. Pour salt in an old wound, but it's directly related to the theme as connected to the gameplay. While Becky can't take turns when we're playing heat to the metal. I've heard this, Beck, Becky failed a key element that if you play this game with Katie and you don't follow this, you don't do this, you're going to get an earful. I know that's hard to believe because she's quiet and introverted. It is.

Important that when? You, if you've never played Heat Pedal to Metal, you play cards based on the gear that you are currently in, one, 2-3 or four. So you play those cards down and you add up the sum of those numbers and that's the spaces you move on the racetrack. It is very important that as you're moving your car, you have to make the car noises. You're a race, so you have to go and if you just go room, she's mad and if you just go 123456 and move your car, she's like

this is not sorry. This is not monopoly. You are not moving on a board. You've got to embrace the theme. So maybe, maybe, maybe you could take turns more if you make a car noise, right? But then it's it's. Things like heat. Like learning? Like you, you were just, you were quite cool on heat. You just didn't really. I see what you did fine. But. It was worth the shot, wasn't it? Really. Yeah, Yeah. Someone laughed. I But once, like you really thought about why you're doing

what you're doing. It unlocked something else. It was like when we. Played. Obsession, You were always a bit like, this is fine, I'm just playing cards, I'm doing this, I'm doing that. But then when you were sort of. Introducing the characters. Into your house. You're bringing them in and you're really bringing them in part of the theme and embracing it. Then you're changing. You're you're you're bringing yourself in, aren't you?

You're more, yeah, but I, I. Definitely think that sometimes after work we'll play a game and I'm like, well that was like a rubbish play or a rubbish game or maybe I wasn't playing it right. But I think it depends how much you invest in going into that world because you can definitely play games just very mechanically, but it's not fun. Like some of the best experiences, and we've talked about this before, are ones where you all invest.

You know, you turn your phones off, you're completely in the game. And I think like something like Dark Tower is a perfect example of this. I don't want to be in my phone because I want to see what's going to happen to all these creatures. And I, I and I, you know, it's ironic because there is a iPad attached to it. But, you know, like I'm in that world. And for the hour or however long it takes to play it, I am, you know, trying to escape from this

world. And I think. Games. A lot of games are far. More inviting. And far more interesting if you immerse yourself in the world that somebody took a long time to actually create right? And it makes. It easier to teach. Actually, if you can say, you know, well, we're here. We're we're going shopping in the market to collect. We, well, for example, we played Survival of the Fascist yesterday. Yeah. And you can play that. Oh, I'm just picking up cars and I'm just removing my creature.

Or you can be like, right, we're, you know, we're foraging for food because the winter's coming and we've got to save up. And. Yeah. And then if you're in it, you're like, oh, OK, I get it. Yeah, it's not like monotonous, monotonous. I'm doing this, then I'm doing this then. Yeah, right, right. So should we talk about my first, my first title that I think is a perfect? Example of what we. Just explained. So I want to talk about Distilled by Patterson Games.

It's a game that the three of us know well. I think the theme of that game is really helpful when you're trying to teach it because the designers did so much homework and research into the theme of distilling alcohol and translating that into a beautiful board game, right? People have heard me talk about it before. What makes that game stand out from all other games is the distill phase, right? When you put all of your ingredients after you've gone to market.

So the market phase and you got your water and your yeast, cause those are the two main ingredients you need, right? And then your sugar, cause your sugar will generate alcohol. Otherwise what's the point? And so the theme will allow you to teach the game. It's like, well, you got it in the market. You need your water and eats, but you also need sugar for alcohol, right? So make sure you buy that and put that in your back wall, your wash back, back wash out. Can't believe I said that.

And then that distill. Phase, right? So we don't have distillers, big massive tanks, but what we do have is we have these cards and so we shuffle them up and the bottom card because that's the drags at the bottom of the tank. And then the top card, which is the foam from the fermentation process that gets skimmed off. So when you're distilling alcohol, you have to use the core of the liquid product in the distill and that's represented in that.

And then you put them in your barrels and you age them. So everything in that game is directly connected to the theme that can help teach that game to someone. This is why you do it. Not because an arbitrary rule book says it, but this. This is why. Right. Yeah. What do you, what do you think? Because you could just say.

Right, you're going to go to the market, pick up whatever you want, and then you're going to take the top card off and you're going to take the bottom card off and there you go. You see what you made and people would be like, sorry, what? What I've got to do what I don't. Understand. But the theme is also. Yes, it's so important for like teaching a game. Like this is the theme. This is what you're doing.

This is why you're doing it. But it's also part of selling the game, because if someone is just the game and it's like, yeah, you, what you're doing is you're just doing this. And then it'll be my turn and I'll do this and then you do that and then I'll do this and then you, that's kind of, that sounds really boring. But if you explain this is the theme, this is what we're doing, it's like, oh, you've sold me on the game. Now I really want to play it.

I have to remind. Myself to play like PJ because no, it's true, because the last time we played distilled, I think we played it like, Oh yeah, you do this and we make this and like at the end of it we were kind of like, well, it was, yeah, it's a good game. So it's it's never going to be

like a bad play. But we weren't like immersed in it. Whereas when I play and I'm like, oh, I'm going to try and make vodka and I'm going to use my, I don't know, one of the, you know, helper people, what they called, I don't know lots of them in the game. I'm going to use one of those. And I'm like talking through what I'm going to do. And you know, how's, how's it going in your brewery or whatever. And you start talking as if you are running a brewery, then it's

much more exciting. You're enthusing other people who you're playing with and selling. It in that. Way. And then you're like, you get people hooked because you're like, Oh yeah, I'm having an experience rather than I'm playing an audience. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so I'll be honest with you. I don't teach many games. I'm not. And Craig and I were talking about the skill of teaching. I'm not very good at it. I'm only good at it when the

theme shines through, Right? I guess because I'm a historian and I'm a student of humans. And why, why did Paverson design this game? Right. Otherwise, just, you know, I think we talked about it when we were over visiting with you is like these designers have chosen these themes, they've done their homework, so we can't just ignore that. But I think to the part of our conversation today is how does that theme assist you with

teaching? So when the theme is is tied like distilled, like obsession other games, it's easier for me to teach, right. I I think it's also connected to you had written down in my notes to prepare for this podcast. How do people have I prepared anything? I've got, I've got, I've got some St. cred to maintain here. Stop it for for the record, it was. Not Craig. It was indeed Becky who had outlined all this. She kept this organized. People, people learn differently, right?

I mean. You're an educator. You. Understand that some people are visual learners, so they need to watch a video. Others are, you know, they can read and just absorb. And I don't know all the terminology that is used in the way people learn, but I'm sure you you could speak a little bit about that. I think that. You have to. Watch the table.

And by that I mean like if you're teaching a new game to people, you can kind of get the gist of whether they're people who you could kind of run through a quick turn and then everybody has a go and they're going to learn on the job of like, you know, while you're playing or whether you need to do a full on teach or whether you need to. Sometimes I think we adapt a game slightly, maybe if it's possible to to change something or take something out that's a

bit more tricky. Like when we played Ark Nova and you said about actually we don't do the kind of take thaty nature of Ark Nova. You know, actually I was like, oh, OK, so you don't have to do that. Oh, immediately now I'm more invested because I don't like to take that element. So I think it's kind of knowing your crowd and knowing how best they learn.

Yeah, it's, it's a difficult. One, I mean, I like for a job have to essentially teach a game within 5 minutes and then off to the next person and I have to kind of gauge a table of 246. However many people there gauge their skill set of what games they've played before and be able to teach them a brand new game potentially in about 5 minutes if that if I'm lucky and get them going and make sure they're happy.

And to do that. A lot of the time it is purely based on this is the theme you're doing these things and this is a really basic overview go. I find it much easier with kids. Like with kids you can go stomp the plank, for example. Stomp the plank is pure push your luck card game. You're flipping cards mechanically and if you get a say, you're moving your

elephant. But will I ever, if I'm ever teaching kids that game, I will go full character mode and explain how you're trying to steal treasure from the evil Captain Giraffe, but you've been caught and you're walking the plank. But can you steal the treasure in time? Can you manage to get? I will go into a full thematic overview of the game, barely touch on the surface of what they're doing mechanically. In the. Game and it's almost like.

That's what we should be doing. To the adults as well, because that's the theme of the game. That's what you're doing, yeah. Mechanically you're doing some things, and there's some confusing things, and some publishers probably put in different terminology. That's another. Thing. That's all all, all. Well put. Put a pin in that one. But when people decide that the same thing, the same thing, the same thing is a just a different word, just a different word.

What do you mean give? An example the for my. Example would be the lovely game that I really do love, Expeditions. When it says. You can take a sweep action, Yeah, it's just. It's just a discard action. It's just. It's just discarding. Why? Why? Why am I? Why is it a sweep action? It's like Magic the Gathering. You tap your card to use, use your ability and attack someone.

In Star Wars Unlimited, you exhaust your unit to do that, and then I think in Lucan it's something else as well, but there's. Yeah, but that's a little, there's a, there's a, there's a legal, there's a legal reason why. It's because the company that put on Magic the Gathering, they trademarked the tap, the tap. So you can't, you can't do that. But the sweep. Yeah. Yeah, is 1. Of those. Things that's a bit more of a a

positive, while I agree with. Everything you said, it's it's silly, but but there it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I get that. I totally get that. Yeah, so I. Think you're absolutely right once again, Craig, I, I I definitely agree with the using a different terminology and everything, but. And I think sometimes those are obstacles to teaching. I don't know, what do you think? Yeah, I mean. I think they're definitely, I think they're, they're an obstacle to learning and to teaching.

Like you've got to look at that and go, what does this word mean? Flick through the book for ages and work it out. And then you're like, oh, it just means this. And then when you teach it, you just say discard. You don't even use the terminology in the game because the terminology that people understand is the base terminology of discard a card, tap a card. Do this I think the easiest.

Games to teach are also ones that come with a player aid or something to to aid, you know, so once you've explained it, sometimes you might want to just check back on what I symbol meant or something. And I think people don't like to play games where they have to keep asking questions of the person who's teaching it. And so they can have something to refer back to or even like Wingspan has the play this like it's, it's like a tutorial version of Wingspan that you can

play. And then like once everybody sorted, OK, let's play the proper game, Seti is a great. Example of like the biggest, like one of the most one quite complicated game, but so easy to teach because of that player aid it's just like perfect, isn't it? Yeah, or. Like a quick rule view on the back of the rule book so you don't have to keep going.

Through pages and pages. I think a clear rule book is helpful for somebody learning it, but also for teaching it, as you can say, well, you know, go to that page or have this page open in front of you for when you want to do that action. I think complicated rule books are difficult one for the person who's trying to learn it, but also, you know, if somebody wants to check a quick rule clarification, it's never that easy, is it? So yeah, Yeah, also.

An obstacle. So I've got a second game. That I want to talk about where the theme is so integrated right, much like to steal and that's men Nefer I promised I promised I was going to talk about it I'd share somebody. OK, so you. Are living in ancient Egypt and there is there's so many sections of the game. This is much much more heavyweight. I think it's a 3.75 on board game geek. I may be wrong, I don't pay much attention to that, but so there's the building of the pyramids of Giza.

You also have to sail your boat up the Nile River and you can go into the cities, dock at the cities to, to to gain contracts that you want to fulfill later on. You have to bury your dead in the necropolis, go to the temple to present goods to appease the gods, right? And build the Sphinx and place them out. And all these will generate you points and whatnot. Here's the key. At the very top, you have your heart and your feather, and they're far apart.

So at the end of each round you lose points for every mark between the two. You need to get them into harmony. This is directly connected to the way that the ancient Egyptians viewed death. When you when you die, they would weigh your heart against a feather. And if you lived a harmonious life, you would be able to pass on.

And so you have to do that. And then once you crossover, once your two pieces crossover, you start gaining victory points because you lose victory points at the end of every round until you achieve harmony. So taking actions that gain you hearts and feathers. When you explain that, you understand why that is such a key component of the game. You're constantly looking to do that. But on your player, Matt, you've got Sphinx, wooden sphinxes and sarcophagi. Here's the interesting thing.

The sarcophagi, on one side, you can kind of see a mummy. On the other side, it's the decorative lid of the sarcophagus. So here's the thing, you have to embalm the dead person first, meaning flip it over on your player mat before you can place the sarcophagus in the necropolis. So that theme, it's still the mechanics of you need to flip it to put it over there. I could tell you to do that without it, but but you have to embalm before you can bury that. I mean, that's still true today.

The sphinxes, you, you take an action to move them over. That represents sculpting. You got to sculpt it before you can put it in place, right? So you do that as well. Same thing with moving of the limestone. You build the pyramids in layers on the top of each quarter. Yes, because they're dividing. 4 top of each quarter is an icon, a fish, feather, heart, and unks because those are the resources

of the game. Whatever icon you cover, you will gain 1 of that resource, and the one that's on the top that you're placing, you will gain one of those in order to take the action where you move your worshippers into the temple. But you have to take the action to get goods 1st and put those goods on your player board so that you have them to give as an offering in the temple. Everything is connected mechanically, but it's immediately. It's tied into the theme so

beautifully. I don't have goods, I can't give offerings, I don't embalm, I can't bury. I can't build the top of the pyramid. I got to build the bottom first, right? When you say it like that, it sounds. So simple, but I'm, I'm guessing some people will be reading the rule book going right. OK, so I can, you know, I can do this or I can do this or I can do this.

And you, the way you've just summarized it, which I guess is like a good teacher is like, OK, so here's what you can do as an ancient Egyptian. And and then I'm immediately more clear on which actions I can take because I'm like, I've got to get my goods because let's talk. About mechanically for a minute with men, never right. So the actions you can take is you can move limestone, which will result in building appearance.

You can flip over sarcophagus. And then later on you can move the sarcophagus into the necropolis. You can move your boat, move your boat into the building. You can activate it, get fish. If it's in the river, get a contract if it's in the city, you move the temple. I mean, it's like it's mechanically it's you're just moving up these tracks and you're putting these pieces out and things are happening and you're getting resources for it. Yeah, mechanically, But why, right?

Why this why this piece? Why this component goes there, right? The designers, Oh my God, they did the research on it's so good. It's so good, and I can't wait to play it with you and I hope everybody gets a copy of Men Nefer because it's just amazing. But the why? Is really important because the why is the reason for the people to be playing in the fact if you're trying to introduce a new game, they're like, OK, but why? Because I've got other games that I like.

Why not play Monopoly? Why not play Kudo? I already play those games. I know those games. Let's play that. So the why is the look come, I'm going to show you this world. You know, you can be an ancient Egyptian in 2025 and you can enjoy that world for 30-40 minutes or however long the game plays and you can immerse yourself in this storyline that we have created together and we will have an experience together. But that's that's the thing, isn't?

It you want to immerse with games, you are wanting to immerse yourself in that. You don't want to be. You're playing the board game to escape real life. You don't want to be like, well, I've got to play 3 cards. I can do this. They're the things that I'm doing. I can flip this like I'm want to be doing the actions. I want to be taking part in the world that I'm in. I don't want to be, but I think

sometimes. The Y gets forgotten because we've certainly had like games days where the sole concern is to try to play as many games as we can and new games that we can as well. So you're like, right, we're going to play this game, right? Put that away, now we're going to play this game. I think. Sometimes it's much better to just slow everything down and be like, right, we're going to play well, we're going to have this.

I keep saying experience, you know, things like I remember playing Obsession, I remember playing Heat. They're very vivid in my mind. I've played a lot of games with other people, but they they don't stick in my mind for the same reason, because we didn't experience it in the same way. We weren't in Master. We played. Molly Khan, we played that epic five player game of side and it was an amazing game. It was so good. We played with everyone. It was really cool.

It was fun because we played with everyone. But at no point did I really go, I am this character, I'm going to do this thing. I was just like, right, I need to do this to score these points, to win this thing. I need to do this, to do this, to do this, and I need to go to war with Steve. That's all I was doing. I wasn't thinking thematically, why is my character doing this and why do I keep going to war with Steve?

Probably because it's fun. But there was no, there was no theme for me to thematically, I wasn't doing anything with my character. I was just being Craig, moving toys around a board rather than being Craig. But you could explore, yeah. With that theme with. The proper theme, yeah. I could have put myself into those shoes as to why I was doing that and I think that's. Sometimes. Why? I enjoy social deduction because you you have no choice but to immerse yourself. I I think.

The only the only time I think maybe there's a drawback to theme is that you get so excited by a theme of a game that it potentially. Falls. Flat when you try and like you're so excited by I mean, I'm sure it's happened and what happened? It happened at work. I, I love Cascadia. I think it's such a good game. Thematically, it's quite nice.

You're building out this landscape, you're attracting animals, you're trying to. It's a bit abstract though, but hey ho. And I get really excited about the theme of it and how beautiful it is and how simple it is to play. And I recommended it and obviously I did a good job recommending it because they was really excited about it and they played it and it felt absolutely flat. They didn't have a clue what

they were doing. They were like, this isn't, this really isn't for us. And it was like the same happened with. Survivorscape Atlantis. So we played that with my family. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. And they were trying to play it so seriously. So true. To the. Mechanisms that they forgot that this is a an island that's essentially sinking and everybody's you know, being lost to to the sea and by giant seamont suddenly. There's a Whirlpool and actually.

You know playing that game mechanically to try and win yes, obviously that's the point to try and win, but it's way more fun to kind of just you know watch the chaos in this shoe and imagine that you're in Atlantis with the with the land disappear. It's The thing is when you. When you approach a game mechanically, it's like, well then what is the point? It's just tasks or work depending, right? Yeah, so.

It's it's it's. All about what the individual player wants to get out of it. I have a really difficult time when the theme is either something I'm not passionate about or it's something I'm not. I don't identify with all that. That's not always true because distilled I'm not I don't identify with like I'm not a big whiskey drinker. I'm not a big drinker at all, but that theme just blew my mind. If it's a mechanical game, I tend to be very like, I think at its core.

That was the problem with. Faraway was. It was just. Mechanics because the. Theme didn't do anything for me at all. I'm just playing cards on the table, which is how you originally felt about Obsession, right? Is. I'm playing. I'm playing cards and laying tiles down. You know. And it's. Like, well, hold on now, let's talk about Lady Ashberry, who's coming to tea with the lady of, you know, the, the, the Manor, you know, whatever. It's like that stuff matters.

That flavor text is really important as talk about a theme that I love and a game. That falls. Flat. It's more about the theme. That's more about the IP really, and that's Star Trek. I don't think there's a good Star Trek board game out there. I mean. Ascendance is good but flawed. Frontiers is. Good, but flawed. There's the new it's. Star Realms basically isn't it, but it is. A. It is a. Complete reskin with Star Trek Over * Realms, but that doesn't technically make.

Sense thematically that that would be yeah, it's but it. Works, It works. It's kind of good. It's not great. I'm not looking to play it everyday, but I I enjoy it when I play it. Yeah. You know, it's like, what is it? I think there's a curse of Star Trek. It just, you know, there's a lot I can name. I can name a lot of Star Wars games I enjoy. I can't name a lot of Star Trek games I enjoy. Is Starship Captains the. Best Star Trek game? See that's. A really good question.

It's. Like is Nemesis. Is Nemesis the best alien game? That's an even better question. You were on it today, man. Look at you. I try. I have a question and it's something that I always found I always find interesting and I don't know why I find this interesting, but do you think good? Players. So players, people who can play a game incredibly well, like know all the strategies and know everything. Do you think good players make good teachers? Absolutely. Not because, because this is.

Always the thing I've. Always thought because I I've I have a degree in performing arts and all the teachers like. Your own vote, but none. Of all of the teachers are all technically actors who are teaching, but none of them are famous. None of them are good actors, but they're good teachers. So because if they were good actors, we'd be watching them on TV, they wouldn't fit in. Classroom. And is it the same with board?

Like if you've got all the strategy down, like I am an absolute master of Seven Wonders Jewel never beaten. But, and that's why we had to sell it. Unfortunately because I was too good at it. Not because it's trash and a really bad dumpster fire of a game, but. Yeah, do do do good. Players with I don't think they do, I think.

That sometimes a good player would have so many like they would be thinking of the end goal of winning and then teaching it through the eyes of right, this is how you're going to get the best score. But that doesn't that doesn't necessarily mean enjoyment for the people who are playing. And then also if you're playing like a cooperative game where you're playing all together, potentially somebody who knows how to play that game is just taking over the game, alpha

game. And so it doesn't become. Yeah, it doesn't become. Teaching it becomes like I'm going to win this game and you're just here for the right, you know, like I think there's a level of. Teaching as well, that's letting people explore and make the mistakes themselves because those people who know all the tactics will be like, no, no, what you should do is this, this would be the best thing to get the most score. No, you need to work that out yourself I think.

Like when we played Ark Nova, PJ would say, or Katie would say, well, have you thought about this? You know, have you thought about using this card? But then I would play cards and then afterwards, you know, you or Katie would say, well, you could have done this, but, you know, I didn't want to interrupt. And I think that's really good because then every subsequent play of Ark Nova, I've gone, Oh yeah, what was it that I made that mistake on? Oh, I'm going to try something

different this time. But if you never, if you never make any mistakes, it's like learning, you know, in school, we we say if you never make any mistakes, you're not actually learning because you've done it right all the time, you know. So I think a good teacher sort of sets up the stool and then says, have a go, have a play with it, see what happens. It's not, might not go right. Yeah, exactly. Preach. Preach, Becky, Preach. You're not. You're not.

Wrong at all. I also think that teaching a game is not the same as mastering a game, right? Yeah, executing, identifying and executing a strategy that wins does not necessarily mean that you can communicate that clearly and concisely to other people. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I would agree with that, yeah. Has it linked to strategies within games as well? Like teaching the strategies in games is kind of like. It's it's too much for.

Learning a game, you can't teach a strategy and be like, this is how this is the best way to do things. It kind of effects, I think the strategy comes. Later, I mean, you've done an episode on, well, what was it called? What was that fancy word? Was that emergent? Emergent. Was that word. Emergent qualities, It was the emerging qualities in board games where strategies emerge after multiple plays, right? But I think that's.

Different to the teaching like the teaching is you're just introducing a game that you know people don't know a new to them game and you're trying to essentially sell it and let them have an enjoyable experience so they go back to it so that then they can learn for themselves the emergence strategies. Yeah, exactly that. So I. Think if people concentrate on when they're trying to teach games, they're also trying to teach people how to win the game rather than just teaching the the.

End goal is obviously. Ideal. You need to know the end goal of what you're, what you're trying to do and what how to win. But how. You need to know how you can win, but you don't need to know how you can win that. Makes sense, right? How you can you need to know how the. End. You know to know. The objective. But you don't need to know how to win. Yeah, on the way. Yes. You just need to play the game and. Get a decent we can't all be Mecca. Dragon. No, no, we. Can't.

So how do you, how do you handle or approach when you're teaching a game to a player or players who after you've taught it, they are hyper focused on trying to come up with the best strategy to win? It's their first time playing. You just did a teach 5 minutes ago, right? You want them to enjoy the game. That's what we've been talking about, right? Theme helps teacher game theme is all about him being immersive and enjoying the game.

But what do you do when they're like, I'm trying to figure out based on what you just told me how I can win this game or get the most points out of this turn, get their head out of the mechanics and back into the enjoyment. How do you handle that? Well, you couldn't. Potentially. Think. If if the. Game is entwined in the theme, as it should be. If you think thematically, that should be the strategy to give you the most points out of it. Technically because. If you're looking.

At a distilled, for example. You're you're you're looking at the theme. So your tactics is like, OK, I want to make I'm going to today we're going to brew gin. How do we brew gin? We need fruit sugar. We need this, that and the other. OK, this is how we're going to brew gin. We're going to get the things that we need to specifically do the thing. So that's how that's how you get the most points out of this. I I also think.

That I would do what I do with people who have analysis process and take my turn extra quickly so they realise that they need. I do that and. It doesn't work. Because inevitably, what happens? Is the player takes so long, I've been like, OK, I'm going to do this. And then something happens, the board changes like OK, well I'm going to do this. And so by the time it gets to my turn, I'm like, I'm done, yeah. Because you took so long. And then we're back to you.

That's the other thing in teaching. Like there's no point. Saying this is the. Best thing because the board state might completely change by the time it gets back round to you so I can give you a strategy that will work right this second but when it comes back round to you, those resources might be gone that space might be taken that card might have been picked up already something else might have been played. You might be out of the game Echo Dragon might have come along.

I don't think we. Have many friends who have analysis paralysis. So I think we're in a quite a lucky position that when we teach new games, you know, generally we know each other well enough to know how long our terms should take. I think we have friends. That math out stuff and they do go, OK, so this is the most optimum use of my SO friend of both podcasts. Whether it's episode 40 or 107, who knows? No one knows John from Try Win Games. He tried fromage. I'm a big fan of Fromage.

I think it's perfect. So are we. Light. Like mid to light after work worker placement game. You want something that's a bit crunchy to play, but it doesn't take 100 years. It's like 45 minutes and done. John messaged me that he enjoyed it, but he worked out and he sent me the maximum points you could score each turn, blah, blah, blah, blah blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And he scienced out every step

of how many points he could get. And he was like, well, I I just didn't really enjoy it because this is exactly what what you can possibly do. This is this is exactly it. It was nice of thinking about the making. The cheese. No, he was like he was looking at winning the he was looking at the exact points. Of how to do. Trying to be. The best so he. He scienced.

It out and he and because of that he was like which he because he scienced it out, he decided to like he kind of spoiled the game like he spoiled it Christmas for himself. But I think that is. What? No, but that is essentially why you don't like 7 Wonders Draw, because you found a strategy that would work. Because it's rubbish, no. You found a. Strategy that would work every time and then it was boring to you see I. Enjoyed it?

Because I was still trying to find the emergent strategies or like, you know, what was going on in the game to win. And I think that's the difference, isn't it? I think it that slowed. Down my love of yeah so I think after. US is a. Perfect, perfect example of that. I love the theme of After us. I love Planet of the Apes, I love monkeys and I love apes and I love planets. Anyway, I love Vincent de Tre artwork, so that ticks all the boxes immediately. And thematically, I get it.

I've got this little tribe of monkeys and we need to get the big gorillas in to help, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. But now I've found a strategy. I found a strategy to. That game that my tribe of monkeys is going out to do the same thing every single time I play it. But if you taught it, you wouldn't. Teach it like that, would you? No. No, because you would. Still want to win the truth? Comes out. No, I would. Because that would ruin it for somebody.

No, you have to. You have to let them. Find those strategies. But the problem there is it's like I found a strategy that wins me the game 95% of the time. 80% of the time, maybe, but. Right. I think that goes back to Nick Bentley. He was our guest when we talked about immersion qualities. That's exactly what he's talking about, is that so many of our hobbyists are like, oh, well, I found the strategy, so I'm done. It's like, no. No, you haven't. You found one, but there's

better. And the more you play the game, the more you realize the different strategies, and it makes a game fresh each time you play it. But yeah, I get that too. There are, but then there's some games that are designed. It's a flaw in the game that has a mathematical minimum and maximum, right? And it's possible. That John figured it out for fromage, I'm still going to like it. Yeah, I've never been up there. Meanwhile, meanwhile, I'm. Writing in my book. Note to self, don't play fromage

with try. Win. Games. I love you, John. I do. I know you're going to listen and but we're not playing fromage well, I definitely. Want to play it with more players so maybe we should like BGA him and make him play from online so I have. A quick question, quick story about Fromage. I played with a good friend of ours here in the US, Michiana Board Gamery. She's like, hey, I just got a a physical copy of Fromage. I want to play it. Are you interested? Cool.

So I played it on BGA. I didn't know what I was doing. I was like why is the board spinning? What? I'm just. Clicking on stuff BGA for me. Here's about learning and teaching. BGA for me is not a good tool to learn a game. No, I had this on my list. I was like, oh, OK, great. So, so many. Times we've been really excited about a game and it's usually with games with Beanie in my shelf life most of the time. And we will be like, oh, you must play this game.

One one of the examples is lost for in Savannah. We love that game and it is on BGA. We like really put Susie off because we played that on BGA and it was way too complicated. Like and also we taught them Survivor escape Atlantis and it was in beta and it was so slow to set up and then take your turns. Like it really put them off. I think it's just it's boring on online. It's just. There's nothing you can. It's just I definitely think

that. Teaching games on BDA is has a. Lot of. Pitfalls like it's, it's not ideal for teaching a newbie a game and letting them experience it. You know, I think I don't. I really. Don't think that like BGA is not a try before you buy service. But what is a try before you buy service is rent shuffle and roll and you can use code GI TG50. Off your. First month. That's GI. TG50 Wow, 50% off your first month at rent, shuffle and roll. Yeah, right. So. PJ your board game menu?

Yep. Three games. That you would bring out and teach to, you know, newbies or people who haven't played those games before. Watch watch picking so. For the appetizer, the appetizer is pot Squara. What's that? Yeah, Pat. Squara So it's a game that I discovered at Gencon. It's a it's a card game. It's a small box game where the theme helps me to teach it you. Are. In Mexico, preparing for the Day of the Dead Dios de Los Muertos. And.

So you're preparing your altar. So one of the things in their culture is you build, you build an altar in your home and you place pictures of your deceased family members and you bake breads and fruits and other little paper mache or ceramic skulls and things that you would put on this altar for that day. A way to keep their memory alive and to help them pass into the afterlife, right? And you do that by you have a little meeple and you move around the market and you're

buying cards. Buying. You're really just trading out cards because you have a cards in your hand and you build like a little, your altar is like a pyramid because like 4 cards, three cards on top of that and two cards for a total of 7610. What is that 9, four and three? 7 + 2 is yeah, OK, 9 cards. And so you're building up the solely and and you score points based on the number of certain icons on the 1st row, the second row in the top row.

And when you explain that, it's like you're exploring this significant cultural moment, right? And it's a simple card game that really doesn't take long. But I'm able to explain why you're doing this. And that's the appetizer. That would be the first game I bring out. It's amazing. You got to check out. It's also beautiful. It's very colorful, much like the altars in Dia de Los Muertos. So I apologize to our Spanish speaking listeners who are offended by my accent.

So what's your main course? I think you know what my. Main course is and that's going to be steam up. You thought you. Thought I was. Going to say obsession, didn't you? But we talked about it and it was going to be. But Steam up's another good one. So steam up by by hopping out of games, right? You're you're eating dim sum out of bamboo steam buns. And part of that is it's a

shared experience. You're rotating the table to be that little conveyor belt of the bamboo steam buns on top of each other. And inside are different types of dim sum items. It's a little asymmetrical because you have a player board and you're going to put them on there. You're trying to collect them. So it's a little bit of set collection. So it's a great way to explain a mechanic set collection to a new new player. But that theme is relevant.

You're at a restaurant eating dim sum and your particular character enjoys this item over another or. I think my favorite one is the grandpa. I think he's a bull, but he's like, he's like the grandfather and in the game you can only take from the quadrant in front of you. He can take from anywhere because he's granddad. So he reach across the table and get what he wants to. Eat right.

And that theme is really tied into the mechanics of the game, and so it helps me to teach it's a little bit bigger of a game. The first player marker is a soft, squishy bow. Bung Epic guys, Epic that is Steam up. So Steam up is my entree and then what you're finishing? The night with so I'm going. To finish the night with first in flight. Oh yeah. This. Game is, is really good.

You are one of the first designers of aircraft in Kitty Hawk, NC here in the US And so you're moving around the board. And So what you're doing, you're you, you have the frame of an aircraft already built. You go to take actions if you can, because if a worker's there, obviously this is a great way to explain worker placement to a new member of the hobby as well. But that theme is still tied into it. You need upgrades to make your

aircraft better. You need patrons who are going to fund you so you can make a better aircraft. You also need practice so you can learn stunts that will enhance your flight. And then you land on the flight zone and it's push your luck. Flip the cards to see how far along you go, right? And if you get a flaw, a major flaw, or you crash, you put those in your garage or your player mat in front of you. You can repair those later, put those cards in the box and pull out a minor flaw, right?

Because you've learned you've fixed that. But it's. Still. Problematic, right? It's just it's a beautiful game so you can teach the mechanics of push your luck and minor worker placement, but the theme is so tied in and you're moving across the board to indicate your flight and like, oh, look, I went further than you this round. You got to get to 40 to win the game, right?

It's just, yeah, that's so that's my menu of board games where themes help me to teach to the people at the table who have never been, who've never played this games before. Did you ever? Yeah, sure. Fine, I haven't. Asked. Me. Because I haven't. Oh well, you've got. Well, you're you're up. Last, so you better get ready. I think. My starter for teaching using theme would actually be Ouch.

We mentioned it before, it's just you're trying to pick flowers off of a cactus and you don't want to get stung. That's the theme. And it's literally you're trying to pick from the side of the card, the side of the cactus, and if you get caught, you get stung. It's a really easy way to explain a game. And then obviously you can explain scoring, whatever, but that's just whatever. But that's theme of a nice light starter game. My main course.

Here we go. It's going to be Everdel because thematically there's a cat there. We go. Ignore that podcast listeners. The cat decided to try and take out the laptop anyway, Everdel and I don't edit, so that's in the podcast anyway. Sorry, Gary. So Everdale is a worker placement game, but not only just like thematically that you can explain your these critters, you're getting these resources

to build houses, build things. You're hiring people to work in your hospitals and your post offices that you've just built and stuff that you've just built. You're also completely. Immersed because. It's a freaking great big tree on the board and a huge amount of beautiful components. And so the theme comes alive because of the production. And also it's just really easy to explain through theme theme what you're doing and why you're doing it. And it just, it just makes

sense. And the events are part of scoring. Having those events, you can be like, Oh yeah, because you've managed to get these people so you can have this party, you can do this and that, so on and so forth. So Everdale is my main course and my final choice. The go home show, the pudding portion, the dessert, the. Whatever they call it. Cheese board is going to be wandering towers. Oh, that's a good. Choice. So, wandering towers. Essentially, there are two ways

to kind of explain the theme. I also like I like the Harry Potter esque. You're racing to get to class and the stairs are moving, whereas they're not stairs in this game. Their towers are moving. And I like. To explain how to fill up your potions, you have to crush your other Wizards and use their blood to fill up the potions to win the game by getting everyone to class with the blood of their other Wizards. I'm not sure that's bang on theme, however.

I'm I'm mostly there. And that's my yeah, that would be my menu. Three games that I enjoy. Things are happening on the on. The things are happening on the pod. Do you have yours? No, I only thought of two. OK, go on then. So we're not going to get a complete meal out of Becky. We're either going to miss out on. PUD we're we're going to play the. The main course multiple times. Oh, I know, I know. You know I know because, PJ, you had a go, didn't you?

And then I had my turn. And then, funnily enough, Becky. Can't take. Turns and that's. How it? Should end. That was a great ending for the. Episode, but no Give me your menu. Quote Express. Which I think is a really easy teach. The theme comes through, you're on the train trying to steal all the money and the loots and avoid the And I think that's that. That was the first game where I thought, oh, board games do something different.

And, and I like to get that across to new people and there's no war. Yeah, no. Exactly. There's no board that's. Great. And then I think I would play. Two games of Distilled 2. Games because. I always play. Distilled and then really want to play another game of distilled because I, I realized, Oh yeah, that's what I was supposed to be doing all along. Can we just redo? So that's what we're doing.

Excellent. So. If Patterson Games is listening both these podcasts, Episode 40 getting the games on air in episode one O 7 and Meeple and meeple. We're looking for sponsorship and we'll happily sponsor you and talk about Distilled all the time. You know so. I want to say one of the interesting things you you tap, you tapped in it just now. So distilled is such a good game. You want to play it again.

So we played men Nefer twice a geek way mini this weekend and of course we but we we won the copy. So we're driving home yesterday in the car and I'm. Thinking about. I'm thinking about actions I want to take the next time we play, right? So yeah. Also about theme being so immersive. So one of the things I wanted to do, and we have not done it yet, we're probably going to need

more than two players. We learned that today because this morning we played men Never again in preparation for this podcast. I wanted to get you have the Great Pyramid and then you have the three minor pyramids. We did not finish them all. That's hard work. And you run out of those build actions because you only get to them as you move across the you move your limestone piece along the track. And so you need help. I can't build the Great Pyramid by myself.

There's not enough build actions. So y'all are going to have to come over and play so we can build these pyramids, I'm telling you. And you can get. Us over to PJ in sunny America just by you know, going to rent shovel and roll and. Then. Using Gitg 50, Yeah, 50% off and. And. We get a little kickback, so we're going to, we can leave the lights on for a little bit longer, pay the electricity bills. We're never going to be. We can go see PJ. We can go see PJ.

So yeah, where? Can they find us? Where can they find you? PJ, thank you for asking. Guys, please don't forget to like and subscribe to our channel on YouTube. We just hit 40 subscribers over the weekend, so that's great. So make sure you like and subscribe, subscribe. You can listen to us on Spotify and all and again on YouTube. We just launched that for episode 100. You can find us at Meeple to Meeple the number 2, not TO Meeple 2 Meeple on Instagram.

I'm the Cajun gamer on Instagram. My cohost Gareth is board game Meeple on Instagram as well, and he's really sorry he couldn't be here today, but this was a fun conversation. So thank you so much And and where can we find you, Craig and Becky? Well I am get. Into that's TO not the number 2 get into games on Instagram and Becky is Mrs. under score get into games. I'll even speak for myself now. Thank you for tuning into. My podcast. You're welcome. Where can we? Find you. I don't.

Know even know what my. Tagline is we can find Becky. Sproul searching at work most of the time. We can find Becky online. At Shirts and Merch's Etsy store. Looking for fantastic shirts at games night and you too could look fantastic. Please leave us our five star rating, five star review on your pod capture of choice, whether that's on the Meatball to Meatball podcast or on Get Into Games on Air. Almost forgot what our podcast was called.

We are in episode 107. Maple to Maple are in episode 40. Scratch. That rewind, try again. Thank you so much for listening and please make sure you are following PJ and Gareth and meeple to meeple on all of those social networks and you're. Listening to Craig and Becky at Get Into Games on air. Not to be confused with Get Into Games or misses. Get Into Games, yes. I'm confused with that. I don't mind. But yes, thank you so much.

We've uploaded every episode onto YouTube as well, so every episode is available from 1:00 to 40. This will be there once I make it public. Some reason it will come part private and I don't understand computers. It's people don't need to know science. They do. They do. Becky, this is important information that our listeners are dying for. They need the information. They love this information. This is the reason I'm just feeling sorry for Gareth. Listening to this one. No, he.

He'll know that it's he'll know at hands with my editing skills. That's right. Never again they'll. Do it again. Possibly the longest. Episode in Maple to Maple history. Well, Gareth. 'S used to that right I mean his his Maple Monday longest one on record was with me. This is what happens when meeples meet meeples and get into games on air. This is what happens. See get into. Games on air connecting podcasts from both sides of the Atlantic. Thanks so much and remember get

into. PJ Why am I? Getting into PJ, I'm not. Going to. Get in. PJ. Well. So that was. After the last. Episode Virus. That's a different website. It's a. My box line I. Don't want to say anything now. Yeah. And into This is what happens when Unite players and podcasters around the world.

Yeah, when are. We getting that battleship so we can meet in the middle of the Atlantic and we can play board games Well, you know if. Meeble to Meeble could find some really powerful sponsors like rent Shuffle and Roll and shirts and merch and maybe even paverson games. We can afford that vessel where we can game in the Atlantic. Yeah, we have a patron. I haven't done anything with it, but we have a patron account set up. I want me and. PJ to be able to play.

Games in the Atlantic and we can live to do it. That's right, A. Couple of million. On Patron. Why are you doing the cut and throat? Symbol. It's really. Rude. That's why you want me to wrap. Up the. Podcast or something, we're going to wrap it up. We're going to. Wrap it up. Just wrap it up if you have got to this part.

Of the podcast you need to leave the comment meatball to games on air in our comments and we love you people who get to the very end of this podcast we do thank you so much for listening and remember too we're going to do it properly now get into. Meatball to meatball. What I. Don't know. Yeah, it does. It doesn't. Work. It doesn't work when we're all together, everything, nothing, you know, but. 3 is the perfect number, right? 3 is the perfect. Number. It's perfect. Cool.

That's right. Thanks. For listening, Yeah, everyone, everyone's doing the cutthroat thing to me, so I better press stop now, all right? So sorry, lads. Have fun. Thanks everyone for listening. Please subscribe and as always, we'd love to hear your thoughts and ideas, so make sure to leave those in the comments and don't forget you can also chat with us both on Instagram at Meeple to Meeple.